"I'm Not Racist - You Are!"

Media Matters has called it the "I'm rubber, you're glue" defense and that's exactly what it is. Bill Bennett is extending the life of this controversy by claiming his critics are the ones who are racist. Media Matters has a nice breakdown of his most ridiculous statements of the week. He is echoed on every point by the various Fox News hosts that are interviewing him. For some inexplicable reason Bennett tries to frame the argument to be about abortion -- that "liberals" don't like someone knocking abortion, and how dare they criticize Bill Bennett! He's pro-life!

No, Bill, the reason people are pissed about what you said is your linking of race and crime in such a pronounced way. If, in making your stupid analogy, you had simply said "all babies" rather than "black babies" your statement would still be ridiculous. But you wouldn't have to hire the Fox News Channel for a week to defend yourself. That's why people are pissed. You made your analogy as though it were some type of accepted fact that blacks are criminals. Maybe in Bill Bennett's world people think like that. But for the rest of us, that kind of thing is offensive. And for the right-wingers to follow Bennett's lead on this is absurd.